Storytelling seniors pour their hearts into books through memoir writing group

Some read their stories dramatically, emphasizing certain words, moving their shoulders, twisting their hips. Others gently related the tales they came to share with a group where candid memories have bound them in unexpected friendships.

For two years, this assortment of 16 to 24 men and women has met weekly at the Lawrence Branch of the Mercer Country Library in a memoir writing group.

The death of their well-loved mentor, Maria Okros, who was struck and killed by a car in November, put the future of the sessions in jeopardy. But an urgent appeal to keep the group meeting weekly and not reduced to a monthly gathering has resulted in a yearlong reprieve as a new group leader is sought.

They are now the Memoir Writing Group, with the word “senior” dropped from the name. Anyone can join them Tuesday afternoons at 2:30 p.m. at the Darrah Lane library location to read from and listen to revelatory works.

Rodney Richards of Yardville has been attending the weekly meetings for almost two years and credits the sessions and the late Okros with improving his writing.

“My writing has gone from being tedious and boring to alive and compelling,” he explained. “It has given me hope as a writer, and I plan to publish my first book, ‘Episodes of ABLIA’ (A Blessed Life in America) in March.”

According to Richards, the group has shared stories of mental illness, murder, growing up, Catholic upbringing, poetry and more. Its informal motto is “Show. Don’t tell,” with results he calls “always touching and honest.”

Richards is one of the many group members who offered gentle but spot-on criticism following the reading of a member’s work. Not everyone volunteered a piece of writing to read aloud, but at the group’s Tuesday meeting, 10 out of 16 women and eight men did so, graciously accepting advice and corrections from a group that had little in common except for a preponderance of reading glasses and graying hair.

Judy Weinberg, whose shyness came through as she read a piece about her wedding day written for her two daughters, presented a remarkably detailed remembrance complete with names, dates and colorful asides about her Jewish marriage in Roosevelt, including a mention of her $50 off-the-rack dress from Ohrbach’s and suffocating corset.

After a round of applause — not every reader got one — a group member commented, “I like your writing because it’s always so thoughtful and accurate and sweet.”

The group members know each other by name and often added comments about previous writings another member has shared. They listened, enraptured, like children hearing a fairy tale for the first time, minus the intrusions of television, video games or ringing cell phones.

Cell phones are a particular nuisance to the group and a newcomer was advised immediately to silence hers. When another woman’s cell began a loud chorus of rings, she got a reprimand and a warning: Next time it rings, you must leave. When it rang again, she voluntarily left the room and returned with it silenced.

With no group leader to replace Okros, Joanne Sutera of Hamilton volunteered to lead the session with a spirited telling of her encounter with a Hackensack car dealer.

“I noticed a tank of gas in my Datsun lasted far longer than my first marriage,” she concluded, drawing a collective laugh from the group.

Carol Blount of Lawrence read “Why Was I Born?” — an account of her student nursing days and of finally finding her purpose in life: “To wear the white cap and to be the comforter of sufferers.”

“When I came to the group I was shy about expressing my feelings,” Blount explained. Now writing her nursing memoir, she says hearing others share their experiences “emboldened” her to “write about things I never thought I could write about.”

Over the course of two hours, the group listened to memoirs depicting streets, buildings, beloved relatives, the feel of weather, the smell of earth, each description edging close to a kind of poetry written about experiences remembered.

“I like the constant feedback of my peers,” said one woman as she headed home.

Another commented that she likes being listened to, that these strangers who have become friends are now witnesses to chapters of her life.

Linda Konrad-Byers, 70, of Ewing wrote a short piece on the importance of remembering her life in a memoir:

“As I hover on the edge of Fall but head toward the Winter of my life, I’m finding myself to be more and more reflective about who I am and how I got here. Remembering stories helps me see how the different life experiences shaped my thinking, affected my self-esteem, and influenced my choices. ‘Storying’ my journey through the memoir writing is also helping me to think about the legacy that I would like to leave and the things I still want and need to do to accomplish unfinished goals.”

As he left, Achilleas Antoniades of Princeton handed a visitor an ode dedicated to the late Okros titled “Maria.”